


Simon's Other List

by rhien



Category: Carry On - Rainbow Rowell, Simon Snow & Related Fandoms, Simon Snow series - Gemma T. Leslie
Genre: Angst, Carry On Secret Santa, CarryOn-era canon, Fluff, M/M, Secret Santa, SnowBaz, ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-09 04:45:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5525849
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhien/pseuds/rhien
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I told Baz, earlier: It hurts to think about things that you can’t have or help. S’better not to think about it.</p>
<p>Sometimes you can ignore something so fiercely (determinedly, desperately) that you almost don’t know it’s there. Like your brain is a locker, and you just don’t look at the back, don’t look into the shadows, just stuff things in there and slam it shut with a clang, and move on.</p>
<p>But now I’m lying on the couch in Baz’s room, and I can’t help it."</p>
<p>(Fits in Carry On, just before chapter 64.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Simon's Other List

**Author's Note:**

> For the Carry On Secret Santa 2015.  
> To: psychomech on tumblr! I hope you like it! 
> 
> [I think there is probably already a fic of this, but I haven’t read it, so here it is.]
> 
> Also: My first post-Carry On fic! O_o

 

I told Baz, earlier: _It hurts to think about things that you can’t have or help. S’better not to think about it._

Sometimes you can ignore something so fiercely (determinedly, desperately) that you almost don’t know it’s there. Like your brain is a locker, and you just don’t look at the back, don’t look into the shadows, just stuff things in there and slam it shut with a clang, and move on.

But now I’m lying on the couch in Baz’s room, and I can’t help it.

It’s December 23rd—no, wait, it must be Christmas Eve by now. Today feels like it’s been a million years long. Vampires and fire and shepherd’s pie on the floor. I’m exhausted. But I’m lying awake on the couch.

With him.

With my arms around him.

After we kissed for hours last night.

Just kissed, really. Clothes on, and Baz got this sort of subtly terrified look at even the suggestion of moving to his bed, so we stayed on the floor, kissing and kissing, heated or lazy or sparkling, time sliding by (and every time I heard the clock chime I was shocked at how fast it was moving), until it was late and my limbs were stiff. Then we sat on the couch instead. (And kissed some more.)

Baz said he’s never… never kissed anyone before. (Well… no, he didn’t. But I think…) Anyway, he learns fast. (Not surprising, of course. The swot.) It only took a few minutes after I said, “Two kisses,” in his room, out of imminent danger and all so he could concentrate, before he was practically a natural at it. I’m pretty sure he learned a lot faster than I did from Agatha. (Maybe I’m a better teacher than Agatha.) (That’s not fair. Neither one of us knew what we were doing at first, back then. And it’s still not her fault that I’m a terrible boyfriend.)

Kissing Agatha was nice, especially once we got the hang of it. Really nice. (Seriously nice.) It wasn’t like all this, though. I don’t know why. Because she’s a girl? (I don’t think so?) Because she wasn’t the right person? (Maybe.) Because I wasn’t? (Probably.) How am I supposed to know?

All I do know, for sure, is that Baz is here. He’s right here, asleep next to me, and I don’t care if the couch is too small, or if he’s a good kisser or a bad one or whatever. I just know I want to keep him here.

So I can’t help it. I think about it. I quit trying to stomp that other list into the bottom of my mental locker, and I take it out, and I look at it.

 

**_Things I’ve always wanted to do to Baz:_ **

**No. 1—Kiss him**

This isn’t one thing. It’s twenty, at least. It might be a hundred, or a thousand, and it’s not just kissing, but I guess I’d better limit myself, like with the food on my Watford list, or I’ll never get anywhere.

But yeah. At least twenty different ways I’d like to kiss Baz. At _least._ My cheeks feel warm at the thought; it’s embarrassing, but it’s just in my head, so who cares? I want to kiss his wide mouth, where it quirks on the left side. I want to kiss him till he can’t smirk anymore. I want to kiss him hard, under the sharp corner of his jaw, right under his ear. I want to kiss the back of his neck; I wonder if I could do it so softly that he almost couldn’t feel it.

I haven’t seen Baz without his shirt in years (he’s always so careful, and I guess maybe I know why now), but our uniform button-ups are white, and thin, and I’m not blind. I want to kiss between his sharp shoulder blades, the knobs of his spine down past his collar. All the way down, to the small of his back, and up again. (I’m not sure I can think about this. It’s all too much. Too many possibilities, and I’ll never get to the rest of my list.)

Maybe I want to peck him on the cheek, all casual-like, and have him just hum and keep reading his book and drinking coffee or whatever, barely noticing. So normal. It’s hard to imagine that, because right now it feels like a shock, every time, like a prickle of electricity, like teeth in my throat. (Metaphorical teeth. I’m not worried. But I know Baz is. ) But maybe. Maybe I want boring kisses, too.

I want to kiss his stupid nose: the bony spot where it starts too high between his eyes, the crook where I broke it back in fifth year. The very tip, even if he laughs at me for it. I want to kiss across to his eyebrows. I want to brush my lips over his eyelids, closed and delicate and faintly webbed with purple and maroon. It makes my throat hurt to think of it, and I don’t know why. 

I’ve only done maybe a quarter of these, even after all those hours of kissing tonight. I want to do them all again. And I want to do more of them.

 

**No. 2—Touch his hair**

I want to touch his hair. To slide my fingers into it, while we’re kissing (I did that already, I know, but I want to do it _again)_ , and other times, too. It’s dark and heavy and smooth and slippery, and it caught a little on my fingers, because my cuticles are rough, and I can’t stop biting my hangnails, no matter how much Penny and Agatha remind me. But I still want to slide my hand into it, or stroke it, over and over.

If I tried, Baz would probably snap at me that he isn’t a cat. (Which is true. Cats are less grumpy. Elspeth’s roommate’s cat last year (it was her familiar) was mostly friendly, anyway.)

 

**No. 2a—Warm his cold hands**

I know they’re cold—vampires and low temperature, all that, plus the way he shivers sometimes or rubs them together. They were so cold in the forest tonight. And his palm is burned from my cross. I wonder if there’s some kind of magical ointment for that.

 

**No. 2, really—Touch him**

I just… I want to touch him. Not like that. (Well. Not just.) I don’t even care—I don’t care if it’s his bare skin, or through layers of posh linen shirts or wool coats or fucking cashmere jumpers or whatever. I don’t care where, I just want to touch him anywhere. (Everywhere.) His shoulders and his waist and the back of his neck and his cheeks and his ankles and his bloody bony elbows.

I will definitely settle for holding his hand. (It doesn’t feel like settling, not a bit. It’s a little cool, maybe a little sweaty in the palms, which should be clammy, but it feels like a bloody miracle.)

It scares me, how much I want it. I almost stop thinking completely, because I can’t… I’m not allowed to want anything this much. It can’t be a good idea to think about this. But maybe just for a few more minutes.

 

( **No. 2b—** His stomach, too. I want to touch his stomach. Is that weird? Maybe I’ll try that soon.)

 

( **No. 2c—** Move _along_ , Snow.)

 

**No. 3—To taste his skin**

Maybe more of his mouth. Maybe his jaw, his throat, his collarbone, maybe—

Maybe this should count under number one, and I need to move on.

 

**No. 4—To make him laugh**

That snorty, stupid laugh, like earlier tonight, instead of the humorless, scornful one I’ve heard for years. I’m not great at jokes, so that’s maybe a problem.

 

**No. 5—To share magic again**

This is a new one on the list, seeing as I didn’t even know it was possible till a month and a half ago. It’s also the craziest one—I’ve got to be mental to think it’s a good idea. I shouldn’t want to do it again. What if he uses it to hurt somebody? (He won’t.) (But I shouldn’t trust that he won’t.) (But he won’t.) What if it hurts _him?_ It’s risky and freaky and nobody should be able to do it at all, but—

But I want to. I want it again. I want to see that soft, dreamy look in his eyes, silver and glittering with stars all around us. I even want to see that dumbstruck look on his face, like when we called the deer in the forest. It’s a little like his shocked expression when I first kissed him… I don’t like the shock (the disbelief) but I like the—the openness of it.

That doesn’t make sense. But I want it. Besides… sharing magic with Baz? It’s the most fun I’ve ever had, using my own magic. It’s a lot better than going off.

 

**No. 6—To fight him**

I don’t mean _fight,_ not like that. I mean like fencing. Like football. Or archery. A competition. Both of us doing our best, giving our all, and instead of hating each other through it, it’s almost like working together to make it a good game or whatever. Almost like the way we’ve been working and researching these past few weeks.

I want to try it, a match of something. Even though he’d probably kick my arse at football. (Though he still limps when he thinks nobody’s watching, so maybe not.) I almost… I think he might be proud of me if I beat him, just like—like I’d feel proud of him.

 

**No. 7—To call him stupid pet names**

I’m not exactly sure which ones, and I think I’m going to have to wait on this anyway. I think he might punch me in the face if I tried to call him “pumpkin” or “sweetness” or “darling” or something. At least at this point. He’d think I was just taking the mickey, and I might be a little. But not really.

Maybe later he won’t mind so much? Maybe? (Maybe there’ll be a later. Somehow.) 

 

**No. 8—To convince him to call me Simon, dammit.**

 

**No. 9—To smell him**

Crowley, that sounds creepy. But I do. I want to bury my nose in his neck and breathe him in, for as long as I want. (And I never want him to smell like burning oak and pine again. Not like last night.) Because, honestly, he smells fan-fucking-tastic.

Also it’s—I just want him to _let_ me do it. Let me get up close like that. Like last night, lying in front of the fireplace, when I pressed him down—and he let me. When I pulled back—teasing a bit, catching my breath—and he followed, helplessly, and my stomach felt coiled, like a burning snake, and my throat hurt, like I couldn’t swallow, and I kissed him again, and he let me....

I try to tell myself to stop thinking about kissing. I don’t really mean it though.

 

**No. 10—To sleep with him**

Ha. Not like that. (Not yet.)

I want to hold Baz while he sleeps. Just like this. I’m squashed between his body and the back of the couch, with one arm under his neck, crooked at a weird angle, and the other wrapped around his middle. Right now he’s a little restless, tiny muscles twitching in his arms, his legs. It’s kind of uncomfortable, to be honest: my arm’s all pins-and-needles, and his hair is in my face (even if it does smell amazing), and he’s so _skinny,_ and the couch is really too narrow, even though that means his back is pressed up against my chest, and I can feel him breathe, from right here, right next to me, instead of across the room. It’s so strange, and so wonderful. I’m afraid to shift, because what if he gets up? What if he thinks I want to get up? (I don’t.) I probably should, because I’m not sure I’ll be able to sleep a wink like this, and I’m _tired._

But I don’t care. I just want—

—I want—

—I can’t think this. I can’t want it. What’s the point? There’s the Humdrum and the old families and the Mage and… I _can’t._

But.

But I say it anyway, at least to myself:

I want to hold him until it’s perfectly comfortable. Until we fit together. I want to hold him until we’re both so used to it that it feels wrong to sleep apart.

I want to hold him every night.

 


End file.
